An internationally renowned expert in information assurance, security and trust, Sandhu holds the Lutcher Brown Distinguished Chair in Cyber Security in the UTSA College of Sciences. He also is executive director of the university's Institute for Cyber Security.

"Professor Sandhu has a keen pulse on current trends in information assurance and security, and his ability to focus that knowledge on research with practical applications is one of the things that makes him such a leader in the field," said Robert Gracy, UTSA vice president for research. "This new IEEE editorial appointment is a testament to Professor Sandhu's successful career. He is certainly well qualified to oversee the IEEE's highly respected journal."

"Although individuals in cyber space want to keep their information secure, they also value the performance of their computers," said George Perry, dean of the UTSA College of Sciences. "The editors at Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing understand this challenge. The journal's presentation of innovative systems, networks and evaluation protocols offers the industry the best possible solutions to the delicate balance of safety and performance."

Sandhu's notable career in security spans more than 35 years. Before joining the UTSA faculty, he served at The Ohio State University and George Mason University, becoming one of the most frequently cited security researchers in the security industry. He is the author of the top two most-cited scholarly papers in access control. One of those papers, "Role-Based Access Control Models," originally published in IEEE Computer in February 1996, has been cited more than 3,500 times. Additionally, he holds 13 U.S. patents for security technology and has received more than 30 sponsored research grants.

In 2000, Sandhu founded TriCipher, a corporation that markets software to protect businesses and their customers from online fraud. Previously, he was a consultant with numerous organizations including McAfee, Trusted Information Systems, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Verizon, SETA Corp., Argonne National Laboratory, Singapore Management University, Northrop Grumman and Integris Health. He has presented short courses, tutorials and invited lectures in Asia, Australia, Europe and both Americas. Today, Sandhu continues to conduct world-leading research at UTSA.

"The best source of scientific truth still lies in the rigor and authority of the peer review process, even as research journals must accelerate their traditional leisurely pace of submission to publication," said Sandhu.

Sandhu is the founding editor-in-chief of ACM Transactions on Information and System Security and served from 1997 to 2004. He earned bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering from the Indian Institutes of Technology in Bombay and New Delhi, respectively, as well as master's and doctoral degrees in computer science from Rutgers University.